


The Fragile and Timeless

by cloudymorals



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: .... eventually, Alternate Universe - Criminals, Blood and Injury, Childhood Trauma, F/F, Gen, Gore, LGBTQ Themes, M/M, Multi, Murder, Slow Burn, Stray Kids as Found Family, it gets dicey whew, street gangs and fictional crime networks, these boys deserve all the love in the world
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-25
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-17 04:00:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28967973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cloudymorals/pseuds/cloudymorals
Summary: Minho wonders if he can describe himself as lucky when his day job has a body count.orhow lee minho found that home can 1. be a place or 2. a rag-tag group of criminals who don't mind the bounty over your head and also (very unsubtly) want to date you.
Relationships: Bang Chan/Lee Minho | Lee Know, Bang Chan/Seo Changbin, Everyone/Everyone, Lee Minho | Lee Know/Seo Changbin, but specific emphasis on, it's hyung line time baybee, skz ot8 - Relationship
Comments: 4
Kudos: 27





	The Fragile and Timeless

**Author's Note:**

> Hi there-
> 
> A couple things before I start: this is my first stray kids fic, though I've been a stay for a while. I've been holding onto this for a bit bc I wanted to do these boys justice hehe. This universe is entirely fictional and I'm using how stray kids are irl as inspirations for character and emotion. The rest is me wanting to write a story of found family, struggle, and slowly learning how to love again :)
> 
> This has the potential to be fairly long and it depends on how you all like it. I'll write stuff either way because I love doing it, but if I'm being honest feedback goes a long way. And I want this to be a two way street if I can! After this chapter, let me know if there is anything you would like to see with the story, dynamics, or relationships and I'll consider putting it in. 
> 
> I don't know if anyone will see this, but I'm writing this note just in case. 
> 
> Until then, enjoy! 
> 
> -b

“Hey! Get back here!”

Minho skidded around a corner, lungs heaving. He sprinted across faded black pavement, the soles of his converse slapping loudly across the bright streets of Seoul. He chanced a look back over his shoulder, grinning as he saw two figures ditch left, splitting themselves off from the rest of the pack.

Perfect.

He veered right, heading straight for a couple eating at an outdoor cafe. He jumped, using their table as a springboard to launch onto a nearby concrete outcropping, running up its steep slope before he threw himself to the ledge of a low-hanging roof garden.

He vaguely registered the gasps of the people below, adrenaline taking over. His brow tensed as he scrambled over flowerpots and a western-looking tomato garden. Huh. He wondered how those survived the winter.

He flew from uneven rooftop to rooftop, the muscles in his calves bulging and straining as he fled from his pursuers. He paused before bridging a large gap between two buildings, landing light on his feet like he’d done it a million times before. Which he had. Outrunning _kkangpae_ , these petty street gangsters, didn’t come easy to just anyone.

It wasn’t long before they’d lost him, circling the crowded square below in an increasingly erratic manner. Minho watched as they tried to play it off, sending paranoid looks upward like he’d start shooting from the sky. Minho laughed quietly as he backed off, traversing as far as he could on the connected rooftops before dropping down to the streets below.

It took a lot of careful maneuvering, ditching his outer hoodie and the baseball cap he’d pulled low over his brow. It was nerve wracking to switch from runaway criminal to blending in with the crowd, but Minho dove into his casual citizen persona with the ease of experience, scanning the horizon for a way out. The buildings down here were large and looming, unlike the closely linked level of apartments he’d left behind, and it took a while before he found a complex low enough to scale up, taking off towards the stairwell below one of the abandoned railways.

He grunted as his shoulder made contact with scuffed cement flooring a few minutes later, the socket jerking out as he rolled and stuck the three-point landing. Shit. It was times like this he remembered he was a runner, not a dive-bombing parkour artist. He jogged up the graying stairs up to the railway, his dark hair curling easily over his forehead, the roots slick with sweat.

Fuck him, but there was nothing like this in the world. Nothing like the high the game gave him. It was the thrill of the chase, sweat and exertion, and he lived off it.

The train tracks stood before him, empty as always. Satisfaction pooled low in his gut, his eyelids fluttering closed almost involuntarily. A small smile settled on his face.

Now that’s how you do it.

 _Click._ The cock of a gun, probably pointed at him.

Well fuck. That’s definitely not how you do it.

The game wasn’t quite over then… nothing he couldn’t handle. He’d been in worse positions before; he’d survive this. Probably.

Minho breathed out once, relaxing back into a limbre, unassuming position. From the sounds of it, there were two of them, maybe more, their boots crunching heavily against the stones and gravel of the railway. He opened one eye slowly, his stare turning dark and dangerous behind their soft, cat-like curve.

If he was lucky, they’d underestimate him and he could end this quickly. If not, well. He’d have to deal with the consequences of bringing a knife to a gunfight.

“‘Caught yah’, crazy fucking bastard.” Bastard? He was expecting bitch, traitor, maybe a homophobic slur or two... but bastard? That was new. Uncreative but different at the very least.

He let the man’s rolling dialect wash over him for a minute, his second eye curving open to join the first. Shame. His voice was rich, almost pretty; he would’ve made for a great storyteller if he hadn’t been such a shitty gangster.

“--urn aroun’, hands up like the bitch you are. We don’t wanna make this _harder_ than it has to be, do we?” Ugh, gross. Minho’s fingers twitched, itching for the concealed blade strapped to his inner thigh. It would only take him a second to slice that gangster’s throat and maybe ten more to castrate him for that blatant innuendo.

Unfortunately, he didn’t have a second, let alone ten. If he wanted time, he was going to have to make it himself.

In the meantime, they were getting closer. His brow twitched, and he slowly turned around, hands raised. Time to get to work.

Minho relaxed, straight lashes dusting his cheekbones as he blinked up at the approaching figure. He thought of Soongie, Doongie and Dori, curving around his legs with large, innocent eyes as he fed them leftover pieces of sushi.

He held his wrists above his head, stalling. It wouldn’t do if he were blasted full of bullets before the real fun began.

The storyteller smiled, satisfied and nasty. “Now that wasn’t so bad, was it?”

Minho‘s gaze flickered. He said nothing.

The smile dropped. “Did I fucking tell ya you could stay quiet?” When he didn’t answer, the storyteller stepped closer, his stale breath washing over Minho’s face. It was overwhelming; he smelled like days-old egg and marketplace fish.

Minho’s stomach lurched. He barely stopped himself from making a face. “Nnh..no.”

The man laughed, hoarse and belly-deep. “Good.” He loosely put the tip of his revolver to Minho’s jugular. “Now follow me. Might get tuh’ live a little before the boss gets his hands on you.”

Minho paused. “Aren’t you going to tie my hands up first?”

Another grin, this one more lecherous than the first. “I’d rather keep my gun cocked on you.”

Minho creased his brows and pushed his mouth down in judgemental disbelief… then shrugged. Well. It was his funeral.

At the storyteller’s behest he stepped forwards, only to still in surprise. That kid definitely wasn’t legal.

No wonder he’d thought there were only two with that fox-faced brat lagging behind them. How much did he weigh— a hundred, hundred-twenty pounds at most? He looked like someone stuffed a marshmallow in a suit then sucked all the fluff out of it, leaving nothing but a gaunt-looking husk with razor sharp cheekbones and dark, roaming eyes. Looking at him was sad, somehow. Unnatural.

Minho looked away, uncomfortable, before glancing back up at the storyteller. Yeesh, still ugly.

The last figure was stocky and well-built. Female. The harsh look in her eyes told him she wouldn’t play it easy. Well, that complicated things a bit. Three-on-one, all with different body types and presumably, different fighting styles. Okayyyyyy. In through the nose, out through the mouth. He could do this.

Minho blinked, slowly. His brow tensed as he forced his hazy mind to focus. He opened his eyes, vision flickering as the world opened up around him. He took in the heightened details of his surroundings; the colors and contrasts in the weed-ridden gravel and the dull, gleaming train tracks sharpening to the point of being painful. He felt the slight hum of the storyteller, his brain forming an acute awareness of the gangster-shaped cluster of atoms buzzing beside him.

And right behind it came sound, tuning into focus like a long-forgotten radio: the soft whispering breeze, the rumbling crunch of gravel beneath his boot-clad foot. The slight clinking of metal as someone turned off the safety on their gun and _ohfuckingno_ —

Minho jerked out of the way one second before a sharp, gold bullet whizzed past his face and struck the ground behind him. Reflexively, the storyteller shot off his revolver, missing the throbbing, heady pulse of Minho’s neck by less than an inch.

Well, a second was a second, and he wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Minho ducked down on one leg, sliding his right hand up his thigh and gripping the hidden blade before using the momentum from his other leg to arch back up in one deft, deadly swoop.

The shiv tore through the muscle and sinew of the storyteller’s throat like butter, the force of Minho’s blow crushing his windpipe. Thick, hot blood spewed from the wound like a geyser, the bitter taste of iron filling his mouth and choking its way down his throat.

The storyteller swayed for a moment, eyes bulging in the back of his head. His old, gnarled hand clutched at his throat before he fell to the ground like a puppet whose strings had been cut. He made one last wet, gurgling whine before falling quiet. Red blood pooled around the body, the storyteller’s limbs twitching like the fish Minho’s mom used to buy in the market when he was a kid.

It shouldn’t have affected him, but it did. The stench of blood and putrid metal filled his nose and lungs, leaving him shell-shocked and unable to move. His jaw moved up and down in shock, gaping like a fish, like the dead man on the ground whose body was cold but moving, dead and yet alive, twitching in the throes of death, eyes hollow and spattered with blood.

Fuck.

He felt slow and heavy, like everything was drenched in molasses, the world around him stained dark and red.

He vaguely noticed the female guard aiming away from them, shooting at something as her torso was suddenly punctured from behind. Another shooter, it seemed.

...That wasn’t good.

He didn’t notice the kid running his way until they tackled into him, pain bursting through his previously jostled shoulder like the bullet from a gun. Fuck, maybe he should just stick to running. Become a track racer and leave all of this illegal shit behind.

The pain sharpened his senses, steeling him as rational thought took control once more. Who was he kidding; if he had been an athlete he would have starved by now. No team wanted to sponsor a street kid, let alone a mentally-sick orphan with a penchant for thieving. He was better off doing this.

Which, speaking of… he’d better get on his feet if he wanted to _keep_ doing this and not be dead on the ground like buff-lady and the storyteller.

Minho scrambled to his feet, hands moving with a frantic edge to pull the lifesaving kid up along with him. They shared one wide-eyed look before sprinting off toward the nearest station covering, hands still held between them. They were closing in when Minho felt his senses twitch, dread pooling in the back of his neck. He ducked, jerking them to the left just in time for another bullet to whiz past their heads, striking a sun-bleached billboard advertising women’s skincare products.

Minho cursed, heart pounding in his throat as he whipped his head around, taking in their chances. The shooter was perched on a rooftop southwest of them, reloading a gleaming bolt-action sniper rifle. Another few seconds and they’d be on them again. Good.

A couple seconds was all he needed.

He let go of the kid, turning fully as he palmed the cool steel of the shiv in his hand. Originally a piece of sheet metal, Minho had sheared away the metal of the makeshift blade over months of stealing from supply depots and selling off the excess. It hovered now, resting perfectly between his fingers. He shifted his weight onto his back foot, pausing for a split second before he hurled the two-sided blade at the hooded shooter. He watched the dark metal soar before it impacted with a sickening crunch right below their Adam's apple. Finally. Minho one, gangsters zero.

The shooter let out a strangled cry, immediately stopping what they were doing to staunch the flow of blood from the gaping wound on their neck. Minho knew that wouldn’t stall them for long, however, and was already gone, taking off after the kid like the hounds of hell were on his heels.

In the few seconds Minho had been occupied the kid had already made it to the steel barrier of the train platform. His thin chest was heaving up and down in panic as he tried to hide. Minho sprinted along the way, sliding the last couple meters along the harsh gravel before he, too, made it behind the weathered metal platform. They were safe, for now.

‘For now’ being the relative term. Who knew where the original shooter was, and how long they had before they’d find themselves with a bullet in the back of their skulls.

“Fuck, we’ve got to get out of here, kid,” Minho muttered, gaze shifting from corner to corner. 

“No shit!” the kid hissed back. “And I doubt I’m much younger than you. How old are you, twenty-two? I’m taller, at least.”

Minho stared at him, incredulous. The kid stared back with dark, unflinching eyes. 

Where did the storyteller find this kid….. in Hell? 

“I want to hurt you,” Minho emphasized, slowly. 

“How? Your knife’s stuck in the ugly guy’s neck. Feel free to try, though,” the demon in a teenager’s body said with a wide, fox-like smile, patting the pistol that hung off his belt. 

Minho shook his head. He did not have time for this. They had to find an exit. 

He looked out at the empty train yard for a couple of seconds before his eyes drifted back towards the kid. 

Ridiculous... he’d find a way to kill him later.

**Author's Note:**

> more people will start to be introduced next chapter. 
> 
> comments are a writer's lifeblood, please contribute :D 
> 
> [(twitter)](https://twitter.com/staybarbz) | [(my writing archive)](https://twitter.com/cloudymorais)


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